Hear all about their recent fashion exhibition on campus!
Shanghai American School Fashion Club president and sophomore Monique Tan recently hosted a Surrealism and Futurism-themed fashion exhibition on the Main Street of her school’s campus. We caught up with her to learn more!
Tell us about your end of the year exhibition. How did you come up with the Surrealism and Futurism theme? Four members completed outfits and chose one of the two themes to make an outfit for. Sophie designed and created a gummy bear dress as well as a matching hat and bag completely out of duct tape, and Willa made a gorgeous futuristic dress out of holographic paper. Jessica’s outfit was inspired by the peacock; she upcycled pieces of old clothing and attached peacock feathers onto the back of the cardigan. For my futuristic design, I altered an old dress and added pieces of holographic material on the top as well as zippers onto the skirt. For my surrealistic outfit, I designed and created a dress out of artificial flowers and leaves, using tissue paper as the base layer.
During the last week of March, our club got together to create cultural outfits for Japan, Korea, America, France, and China, to be put on display for Culture Awareness Club’s “International Day” event. These were made out of recycled tissue paper on mini wooden mannequins and are now also on display for our exhibition.
What were some of the challenges and highlights putting the exhibition together? One of the highlights was definitely the process of creating our pieces. From getting inspiration to designing and choosing materials, the whole journey was truly gratifying! We learned how to create pieces of clothing using different techniques and materials through research and experimentations, and as a result they turned out one-of-a-kind.
We had a photo shoot in our school’s photography studio with the help of our friend Andrew, and these photos were displayed on our design boards. One of the biggest challenges we faced was time management, as some members were too busy to complete their pieces on time. However, our exhibition was a huge success as we’ve already received tons of compliments so far during our first week!
Were there any standout designs you’d like to mention? I think that all our designs turned out fabulous, and all of us worked really hard to complete them. However, I would like to give a shout out to Jessica’s design, which was inspired by the peacock. Her design board was really creative as well; the color scheme, arrangement, and everything looked so amazing!
Any advice you’d share with fellow Fashion Club presidents when planning an exhibition or event? Make sure you manage your time wisely! Don’t procrastinate. Always keep track on each of your members’ progress, and be strict in ensuring that they won’t procrastinate too. Always offer advice or extra help to them if they need it. Before deciding the location to set up the exhibition, ask your members for their opinions and suggestions as well as your supervisor and other teachers too. It’s always best to choose a centralized location because you want people to see it, you want as many people as you can get!
